The Courtship of Steve Rogers
by tolieawake
Summary: OR, How the Winter Soldier caught Captain America, and Bucky Barnes kept a 70-year-old promise. "If we could," Bucky said, "I'd take you dancing." "The Winter Soldier," Fury said, tossing the folder down onto the table, "will be completing an assassination tomorrow night. All we know, is where the assassination is meant to take place." "So, Cap," Tony asked, "ready to go dancing?"
1. 70 years ago

The Courtship of Steve Rogers,

OR, how the Winter Soldier caught Captain America, and Bucky Barnes kept a 70-year-old promise

* * *

"_If we could," Bucky said, stretched out against the hard concrete of the roof beneath them, arms folded behind his head, "I'd take you dancing." He turned his head to look at Steve, grinning at him._

"_What?" Steve asked with a laugh, frowning slightly. It was midsummer, the air warm around them, and Bucky had stripped down to his undershirt. His forearms and biceps caught Steve's attention for a moment, before his eyes flitted back to Bucky's. They were alone on the building's rooftop, having laid themselves out to try and catch the slight breeze._

_Bucky shrugged. "I'd take you dancing," he said, "out to dinner, an opera, maybe – that's what rich folks do, right?" He grinned, the corners of his eyes crinkling as he nudged Steve's shoulder with his own._

_Steve nudged back._

"_Out to the bar, dancing," Bucky continued._

"_What? Again?"_

"_Sure, I like dancing."_

_Steve laughed. "'Course you do," he said. "You're good at it."_

_Bucky shrugged once more. "It's all about having the right partner," he said, "you and me, we've always been the best partners."_

"_You just say that 'cos you taught me to dance."_

"_Still true."_

"_Flatterer."_

"_I'd buy you flowers -"_

"_I'm not a girl -"_

"_Take you out on a picnic, somewhere nice. Then I'd ask you to marry me."_

"_Buck -"_

"_And I'd have it all set up, so soon as you said 'yes', we'd get married, right there in the park. And nobody would ever try to split us up ever again."_

_Steve swallowed, hard, blinking against the harsh wetness in his eyes. "So sure I'd say yes?" he asked._

"_'Course," Bucky replied. "I just told you I'd court you first. Do it right. Ain't no-one gonna say Bucky Barnes didn't do right by Steve Rogers. 'Sides, you never could say no to me."_

_Steve snorted, but it was half-sob. "I never could," he agreed, letting the truth settle between them._

"_I'd take you dancing."_


	2. I'd take you dancing

"The Winter Soldier," Fury said, tossing the folder down onto the table. Leaning forward, Steve slid it towards himself, flipping open the cover. Inside, there were merely two pieces of paper, black on white, lines of text. A small diagram of what appeared to be some kind of an arm. He frowned.

"That," Fury continued, catching Steve's look, "is all our information on him."

"All of it?" Steve couldn't quite stop the exclamation from escaping his mouth.

"All of it," Fury repeated.

Leaning over Steve's shoulder, Tony poked at the file with one finger. "Seriously?" he asked. "You run, like, the biggest intelligence agency in the world, and this is all you have on someone?" He tilted his head to read.

_Current Status: unknown_

_Kill Count: unconfirmed. Estimated in the 60s._

_Current Affiliation: unknown. _

_Past Affiliations: the Red Room (Soviet Russia)_

Lifting his eyes from the brief information displayed before them, Steve looked back up at Fury. "What do we need to know?" he asked.

"A lot more than I can tell you," the director replied. "The Winter Soldier is generally considered to be a ghost story of the intelligence world. Kind of like the boogey man for spies."

"Why?" Tony asked, "what's so good about him?"

"He always fulfills his mission," Fury replied, "and then he vanishes again. Sometimes for days, sometimes for weeks, sometimes for months, sometimes for years. The only confirmed sightings there have ever been of him have been during a mission. The rest of the time, it's as though he doesn't exist."

"Does he?" Steve asked. "Exist, I mean? Or is it, like, a title? Passed on between assassins?"

"He exists," Natasha spoke up for the first time. She made no move towards the folder, and Steve turned a concerned glance on her. In response, she pressed a smile across her lips, short and tight.

"Nah, he can't," Tony replied, poking at the file once more. "This says his first confirmed kill was back in the 60s. If it was the same guy, he'd be old by now. To old to still be running around killing people."

Natasha shrugged. "He exists," she repeated. Clint shot her a glance, but said nothing.

"So why do we need to know about him?" Steve asked, turning back to Fury. "If he only ever appears when he's completing a mission, then -"

"Then we have intel that he's about to complete a mission, yes," Fury agreed. "Someone, somewhere, decided to drop us a line. Let us know that the Winter Soldier will be completing an assassination tomorrow night."

"Who?"

"We don't know." Fury frowned, looking entirely put-out by this. "All we know, is where the assassination is meant to take place." He dropped another folder onto the table. Reaching over, Steve flipped it open, and Tony whistled.

"That's posh," he said.

"What, you been there before?" Steve asked. Laughing, Tony clapped him on the shoulder.

"Not really my kinda place," he replied, "but hey, it's probably yours, grandpa."

Steve glanced down at the glossy images of some kind of dance hall. Like Tony said, it looked rather rich. Elegant, extravagant, and yet somehow tasteful. Rich draperies, chandeliers, and people dancing all dressed to the nines.

"Our intel on the Winter Soldier suggests that he is of an average build, dark hair, and with one metal arm."

"Excuse me?" Tony asked.

"You heard me, Stark," Fury replied. He fixed them all with a stare from his one good eye. "This may be our best chance this decade of capturing this guy," he said. "Don't let me down."

Frowning, Steve dragged the images of the dance hall closer to himself, studying the information on its surroundings. "And we have no idea who he's after?" he asked.

"Only that they will be there, somewhere, tomorrow night," Fury agreed.

Steve nodded. "Hawkeye, Iron Man," he said, "we'll need you outside. Hawkeye, can you canvas the area tomorrow? Find the best vantage points, and then set yourself up on one. See if you can't figure out where he's going to take the shot from." Clint nodded. Steve turned to Tony. "We'll need Iron Man as air support. Eyes in the sky, and ready to fly in as needed."

"Sure thing, Cap," Tony agreed.

Tapping his finger against the file, Steve considered their other options. "Widow and I will be inside. Try and figure out who he's after, and provide support from that end." He glanced over at Bruce. "How would you feel being inside?" he asked.

Bruce gave a small half-smile. "Honestly?" he replied, "I don't think you want the Other Guy in range if someone's going to start firing."

Steve nodded. "Thor's not back 'til next week," he added, then glanced up at Fury. "Back-up?" he asked.

"All the staff will be replaced with Agents," Fury told them, "there will also be Agents situated in the surrounding streets. You'll be linked via comms. We're not sure what tech the Winter Soldier will have access to, some of his hits have been straight-forward, bullet to the head, ones; others have involved advanced tech, or even more up-close-and-personal approaches. So be prepared for anything."

Nodding, Steve pushed himself to his feet.

"So, Cap," Tony asked, "you ready to go dancing?"

For a moment, Steve froze, hand reaching out to grab the file.

"Cap?" Tony asked.

Shaking himself, Steve picked up the file, turning to leave. "Depends on the partner," he replied, striding out of the room.

* * *

Dressed in a suit that Stark had gotten from somewhere (and frankly faintly concerned by just how well it actually fit him), Steve tugged at the tie round his throat.

"You look fine," Natasha's voice murmured in his ear.

Letting a small, wry smile cross his face, Steve stepped further into the room. "Doesn't mean it's comfortable," he replied softly, knowing his comms would pick it up.

He glanced around the room, the interior matching the images he had studied in preparation for the mission. There was the sweeping staircase leading up to a balcony that overhung the room on every side. There the bar, tucked under the balcony and far swankier than any bar he'd been to before. There the polished oak doors that led to the restrooms. There the small, round tables ringing the open expanse of dance floor. There the small stage, live band set up on it.

He couldn't see Natasha, but wasn't looking for her. She would be there somewhere, mingling, making herself fit in in a way that Steve wasn't sure he could ever emulate. But he could try.

Moving between the other richly dressed patrons, Steve made his way over to one of the small, round tables, close to the wall and away from the dance floor. Taking a seat, he leant back, letting his eyes wander around the room.

The problem, the real problem they had – other than the fact that they didn't even know what the Winter Soldier looked like – was that they didn't know who his target was. Trying to stop a master assassin, without knowing what the assassin looked like, or who his target was – all they had to go on was the venue.

The night was still young, and so Steve was able to take in all the patrons, studying them. For each one, he wondered if they were the potential target. He saw Natasha, talking softly with someone, laughing brightly, head thrown back, before flitting away and vanishing into the room with ease despite her bright red dress.

Slowly, more and more people began to arrive. The band's music changed from soft, teasing strains, to the kind of music you could dance to.

"I hear the music starting up – if you call that music," Tony said, voice coming clearly to Steve through his comms. "You gonna dance?"

Steve rolled his eyes, before stopping himself. It wouldn't do for anyone to see him reacting to someone who wasn't there. "I don't think that's the point," he replied.

"I dunno," Natasha cut in, "it might help with the whole, 'blend in' thing." Steve could hear the smile in her voice, even if he couldn't see her.

A waiter came by, offering him a drink, and he accepted, holding it between his hands. A few people had drifted out into the middle of the room and were starting to dance.

"Don't have a partner," he said, taking a sip of his drink.

"So go get one," Tony said. In the background, Steve could hear the whirr of the suit. "It's not that hard. Just bat those baby blues and smile nicely, I'm sure there are people there who go for that wholesome, all-American thing." There was a pause. "You do know how to dance, don't you?"

"Yeah," Steve said. "I know how to dance." He glanced down at the table.

"_C'mon Stevie, it's easy."  
_

"_I dunno, Buck. You know me, I want to, but -"_

"_So we'll take it slow. You haven't been coughing for days. You can do this. Nothing too active, I promise."_

Pushing himself to his feet, Steve took his drink with him as he wandered around the room, trying to look like he knew what he was doing, even as he studied each person he passed.

"That doesn't look like dancing," Tony commented.

"Still don't have a partner," Steve murmured. He moved past the bar, deliberately turning his gaze away from the brunette seated there who had hair the same shade as Bucky's. If he let himself, he'd see his friend in every dark-haired man out there.

Making his way back to the table, Steve sat down. A whirl of red in the corner of his eye let him know that Natasha, at least, was taking Tony's advice and dancing.

"Anything?" he asked.

"Nothing up here," Tony replied immediately, "and can I just say, the ban on music while on missions makes things really quite boring. So, please, relieve my boredom and do something interesting. Dance. Talk to someone. I don't know. Sing a number."

Steve grimaced – he wished Howard hadn't kept quite so much 'Captain America' memorabilia, or at least, that Tony had never seen any of the footage of his 'chorus-girl' days.

"No movement," Clint reported, voice the steady calm he always seemed to descend into when settling in to wait.

"Nothing suspicious on the cameras," Bruce added. He was back at Stark (Avengers) Tower, watching the feed from the security cameras in the building.

"I could have told you that," Tony complained. "It's completely boring. Do you think you could organise a fight or something? Hey, maybe Nat could make some guys fight over her?"

Pushing back his urge to roll his eyes, Steve instead focused on looking around the room once more.

There was no reply from Natasha, but she would let him know if she did see anything.

"Ooh look," Tony said suddenly, voice bright with glee. "Maybe we will get some entertainment this evening."

"What?" Steve asked.

Tony laughed.

Bruce sighed. "There's a guy headed towards you," he said. Steve stiffened, slipping easily from alert into high alert.

"Not that kind of 'heading towards you', Cap," Tony said. "You may just get to entertain me with some dancing after all."

Nat's laughter washed over the line, and Steve spent a brief moment searching out her lithe form on the dance floor, before turning to look at whoever was approaching him. He froze.

His breath caught in his chest, and for a moment it felt as thought he was going to have his first asthma attack since the serum. Broad shoulders filling out a pressed black suit, slim waist, strong thighs. Each movement confident and sure.

Slowly, Steve raised his eyes towards the man's face, hoping to dispel the image he had in his head. His throat went dry.

Bright blue-grey eyes, cocky-jut of the chin, small smirk curving over his lips and a fall of brown hair framing his face.

The man came to a stop before Steve. "Hey," he said, holding out one hand.

"_Hey," Bucky said, holding out one hand. "Let's practice your dancing."_

"_You just like dancing," he grumbled, but pushed himself to his feet anyway. He never could deny Bucky anything._

"Hey," Steve managed to get out. His heart was pounding in his chest and he suddenly wanted to wipe his hands against his pants in case his palms were sweaty. This wasn't Bucky, he told himself. Bucky died, seventy years ago and half a world away. Steve watched him fall.

None of that did anything to steady his heartbeat or breathing.

The stranger smirked at him, wiggling his hand from side-to-side. "Dance?" he asked.

"Dance! Dance! Dance! Dance!" Tony chanted in Steve's ear, but he couldn't hear him.

Swallowing, Steve pushed himself to his feet, reaching out to take the stranger's hand. It even felt like Bucky.

"Yes!" Tony declared.

With a grin, the stranger pulled Steve towards himself, reeling him in with a strength that was reassuring without being controlling. Half in a daze, Steve let himself be led out onto the floor and then pulled into that weird (comfortable, familiar) embrace that came from dancing.

Bucky's – the stranger's – hands were firm and sure against him, one on his waist, the other clasping his hand tight. Without thinking, Steve reached out, placing his free hand on the stranger's shoulder. The stranger led, and Steve followed.

They moved around the room easily, and if Steve himself had been a little smaller, he could have imagined he was standing back in their tiny little apartment in Brooklyn, back before the war, letting Bucky spin him around until they were both laughing and Steve had to stop to catch his breath.

"Try not to look too startled," Nat's voice, dry, came through his earpiece. "It's just dancing."

Steve didn't know how, couldn't tell her, that it wasn't the dancing that had stolen his breath. It was his partner.

"Maybe it's the fact that it's a guy," Tony mused out loud. "SHIELD did have that 'sexual revolution' conversation with you, didn't they, Cap?"

Steve could have told Tony that he'd grown up in Brooklyn. Told him about the kind of bars and crowds he'd seen growing up, and reminded Tony that yes, people did have sex in the 40s, and not just the behind-closed-doors and only-while-married kind that Tony seemed to think. But he had no thoughts to spare for Tony, or Nat, or anyone else.

His feet moved easily over the floor, his body leaning and turning and spinning, _following_, as his partner guided them easily.

"I have to say, Cap," Tony continued, "at least you're right – you can dance." There was a hint of approval there, but again, Steve took no notice.

He was meant to be watching the room. Mingling, but keeping an eye out. Wary for the Winter Soldier's target. Instead, his eyes were fixed on those opposite him, on the slight smirk beneath, the fall of hair he wanted to push his fingers into.

What if this man, this stranger, was the Winter Soldier's target? Grip tightening, Steve pulled his partner closer to himself. The man came with an easy huff of laughter, until their bodies were touching, lightly, short sparks of contact at hands and arms and hips and chests.

"Yeah," Tony said, "this night has certainly gotten more entertaining."

Steve ignored him.

The song changed, music flowing from one into another, but Steve followed effortlessly as his partner led, switching his steps with ease, even as his breath threatened to freeze in his chest.

One song, then another, and another. Normally, by this stage, Steve would be wheezing and laughing, bent double as he tried to catch his breath, Bucky plastered against his side or back, grinning and laughing too, but also checking his breathing, casting worried side-glances to make sure Steve wasn't actually going to have an attack.

No attack came. They continued dancing.

"Well," said Tony, "I guess that super soldier stamina is useful for more than one thing." There was a sigh. "You know, this really is more interesting if you actually react, Cap."

Steve still ignored him.

The music wound down, slowing, and he stepped closer to his partner, until they were so close he could barely tell where he ended and the other man began. They hadn't spoken once, not since the stranger asked him to dance. Steve wanted to talk to him, to hear him speak, but he also wanted the stranger to keep his mouth shut, to keep the illusion that this was Bucky, come to dance with him once more.

"Okay, I gotta ask," Tony said, "we sure this Winter Soldier guy is actually going to make a move? 'Cos this place closes soon and we haven't seen hide nor hair of him."

"We stay 'til closing," Natasha replied.

"You think he made us?" Tony asked. "'Cos, you know, I was worried about Cap blending in originally, but now, not so much. Although maybe he could stop dancing so well, you know. Only, I don't think anyone's gonna think he's here for any reason other than the dancing."

The last song came to a close, and Steve found himself standing, silent, in the middle of the room. Pressed thigh to shoulder to his partner, eyes still boring into the other man's as though afraid he would vanish as soon as he looked away.

The man's smirk turned into a small smile as he reached up with his right hand to brush gently against Steve's face.

"Thank you," he said.

"_Thank you," Bucky said, once Steve had caught his breath and their laughter had died down. Reaching out, he brushed his thumb over Steve's cheek. _

_Steve rolled his eyes, but smiled, leaning into the touch. "You don't have to thank me," he said._

Without conscious though, Steve leaned into the touch. "You don't have to thank me," he said. Smiling soft, and slightly sad, the stranger stepped back from him, letting his hand drop.

"Yeah, I do," he replied. Turning on his heel, he moved away into the dispersing crowd.

Swallowing hard, Steve watched him go, hands clenching to stop himself from reaching up to press against his cheek, or reach out after the ghost of his past.

* * *

It was only later, once they had given the entire place a thorough few going overs, Clint and Tony had checked all possible vantage points outside, and everyone had gone home, having decided that either something was wrong with their intel, or something had spooked the Winter Soldier, causing him either not to show or not to attempt his hit, that Steve realised the stranger with Bucky's eyes and Bucky's hair and Bucky's smile and Bucky's shoulders and waist and thighs – had been wearing gloves.

That night, he dreamt of dancing, and laughter and the soft wash of a cool summer breeze across his skin, tugging at the edges of his memory.


End file.
